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A live stereo recording made during a session at the Attic practic studios on the 28th of July 2009. The tracklisting is primarily composed of new songs, but also features new versions of the songs ‘Maiden’ and ‘Madness of the Feral Moon’, both originally available on the Tales From Rivelin album and re-recorded to better reflect the current line-up of the band.

Due to a problem with Wib’s bass pedal, he was unable to play any double-kick patterns for this practice, which explains why there is no double-kick on the recording.

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Northern OakSheffield, UK

Founded in early 2006 during a wintry excursion to the Peak District, Northern Oak have been spreading their unique brand of
flute-heavy progressive folk metal across Sheffield and the rest of the UK ever since.Our music sounds like Jethro Tull played by extreme metal fans with an appreciation for everything from Pink Floyd to Emperor....more

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If you could gaze into a snowflake, what would you find in each one? Those crystalline structures of unearthly perfection, as they fall they transform their environment into a sparkling wonder.

I can only find a rival for their beauty in mankind, those myriad beings messily constructed from hopes and beliefs. With aspirations that defy all measurement but they are no stronger than when they act with one mind.

As they continue to fall, blanketing their surroundings, suffocating them. How can one do anything but marvel at their tyranny? Their cold indifference to all they consume.

No matter how many line the foundations,
whether it be one or a million.
All are lost without a trace
beneath their advance.

Track Name: Maiden (2009)

Beneath the twilight sun
A young maiden stood,
At her conjugal altar,
Ardently awaiting her swain.

Through labyrinths of hedges, she at last him did spy.
In all his gleaming armour, how long she had yearned for this day.

Instrumental

Him she did follow,
Away from the altar,
And through worlds of mist so thick,
Whence the helpless sun does but shudder and flee.

Alas his tracks soon were lost,
As ghostly snow descended,
She wept amongst the banshees,
In the cold forsaken woodland.

But there remained a flicker of hope,
As torchlight she did spy,
And this, she followed...

Down there in the heedless town,
the seething hex at its gory crown,
bloodlust and rage amongst the gloom,
the madness of the feral moon!

Night of the wolf a fatal time,
desert the camps, flee the mine,
hide away from the wolfen fiend.
Harking! Tracing!

The final scream of helpless prey,
shredded and torn in a frenzied way,
human meat a vicious feast.
Devouring!

Guitar solo- Flute solo- Guitar solo- Keyboard solo

Down there in the heedless town,
the seething hex at its gory crown,
bloodlust and rage amongst the gloom,
the madness of the feral moon!

Blood has fallen, silence resounds!
Broken by the screaming hounds!
Run back to your earthen tomb!
Suffer the madness of the feral moon!

Track Name: In These Hills

The days have lost their candour and the nights are endless.
The ruined foundations of your dreams with her,
spur you on in search of why she deserved such cruelty.

But you wonder, do you really want a reason for her suffering?
Or to find some logic, for why yours should have to continue.
Offering fresh sacrifice you ask the priests and they solemnly say,

"The answers you seek can be found atop the hills that claw at the morning star
But be prepared, you may not be able to leave behind what you find."

Pausing
your ascent
you remember.

The sound
of her
voice.

The gentle
touch of
her fingers.

Whispered
trysts
until dawn...

*grido di dolore*

That life is gone, you reach the peak and your eyes dart in search,
where are the answers? What does an oracle look like?
Then you begin to notice, the regular deafening crashes of the wind.

This is the beating heart of Chaos,
it was here before the gods and will outlast them.
In a universe where stars explode and planets collide,
there was never an explanation
for what happened there.
No fate to justify your loss.

Your cry of anguish
is caught by the wind and lost
in these hills.

Track Name: Gawain

Last Christmas at the feast at King Arthur's court
a monstrous figure entered dressed head to toe in green.
With a wicked blade in his hands he challenged us,
"Would the bravest knight take sport in an exchange of blows."

Arthur rose first but I quickly took the axe.
I could not risk Guinevere being left alone.
With one fell strike I cleaved the head from his shoulders
and had assumed myself free from reprisal.

But the courtiers' cheers quickly became cries,
as the corpse rose covered in its crimson.

"Gawain", it spoke, "seek me out in a year's time.
Come receive my blow or be known a defaulter."

The allotted time has passed.
I stand before the Green Chapel.
This is my last chance to turn back.
Though I appear resolute
my soul is uncontrollable,
like forked lightning down my veins.
Trying to escape the fate
of this doomed knight.

My king, I will not falter now.
I will leave no trawpe un-honoured.
No man will brand me coward.
If the Green Knight shall take my head,
then so be it...